Prayapolooza in Houston

[kib]

It is a hard task to undo thousands of years of social convention in the course of a generation or two and anyone or any organization who labels those who don't get on board soon enough as haters, racists, etc., do their cause a dis-service.

Interesting point. I think ... the world moves a lot faster than it used to. We once had a convention that surely Some groups were less deserving or inferior to others. Africans were an inferior race, period. "Mongoloids" were next down on the list, etc. Very heirarchical, place-on-the-ladder organization of thought, without much shift at all. About 100 years ago, we moved as a society to shifting that heirarchy around. Ok maybe women weren't inferior, but surely African Americans were. Ok, well maybe not them either, but surely Hispanics. And so on. Basially reshuffling who stood where on the ladder.

It seems to me that the world may have reached a tipping point with this in recognizing that perhaps this isn't a ladder at all, and no group necessarily stands lower than any other. Not everyone has shifted this elemental way of organizing their thought process, there are still whole societies in which respect revolves around some un-chosen characteristic like sex or family of origin, one's "place" (on the ladder) but this basic internal organization strategy in the brain seems to have changed for many people.

I get what you're saying about patience, Alan, but I think the majority here on these boards have shifted their thoughts or if they are younger, were born without the heirarchy mind-set and are impatient for others to "see the light" as far as a non-heirarchical frame for any and every group. It's not really about gays, it's about rethinking the idea of listing groups in order of valor or virtue at all. For people coming from a non-heirarchical place, it's sort of mind boggling to think that each and every group still needs to be individually sniffed over for decades before being granted the respect and privilege that other groups enjoy. If you're coming from a place of non-heirarchy, arguing about the validity of gay rights seems as illogical as arguing whether blue is as good a color as green.

Patience IS a virtue, and a good tool for getting things done over time. But it's sandpaper on the soul for all of us to be coming from such varying perspectives and try to gently understand the POV of others that seems so obviously wrong. Maybe that's where patience really comes in. :-)

[Catwoman]

What is civil about responding to someone's post with what amounts to an accusation of bigotry? If she had directly called me a name - then would you have done something about it? The comparison to my views with slave-holding southerners in "Gone With the Wind" is again the cattiest, least profitable remark one can possibly make. Did that make a contribution to this discussion other than to make Peggy feel as if she sits in the morally superior postion and sneers down at the less-enlightened southerner? Usually these discussions are good for thought. Apparently I need some anti-venin cuz I have been snake-bit. You are right personal attacks do not add to the discussion, they shut it down. It could have been enlightening but it just stung - and not from truth - from viciousness.

[loosechickens]

Catwoman, I'm sorry for being so long in getting back to you....I just now got on.

I don't have any idea whatsoever of how the friendship, acquaintanceship, business relationship, etc., you may have with your husband's business partners, or employees who happen to be gay, works.

I can only speak from my own experience, or what is said to me from friends who are gay, and I would find it very unusual to have any kind of close relationship with a gay person these days, and not have gay issues, gay rights, discussions of discriminations faced, etc., talked about. My friends who are gay are intensely interested in all the things that affect their lives. And because of that interest, those issues are often discussed with their friends, including us.

So my ASSUMPTION (and please note, I am saying assumption, because I am not privy to the ins and outs or depth of your relationship with said people), my impression would be that you have a business relationship. It may be friendly and "warm", as you say, and YOU may consider those people your friends, but I would almost bet that were you able to get an unvarnished opinion from THEM, and they were honest, they would not consider what you describe as a real "friendship" at all. After all, a friendship with a Christian, very conservative Texas heterosexual, with all that connotes in political outlook, the attitude toward gay equality and gay rights, including marriage to most Christian, conservative, Texas heterosexuals, would be something very difficult to have to negotiate, if any real relationship were to be taking place.

And if that relationship carefully skirted around issues that are of extreme interest to gay people, sweeping them "under the rug" so to speak, it would be a business association, and not a real friendship at all. Of course the subject might not come up between you. Why would it? Do you really believe they don't understand completely your religious and political views?

Rest assured, whether you see it or not, it would be an extremely RARE gay person today who would not be very concerned about issues of equality, rights, etc. If they aren't talking to you about their concerns, it speaks volumes as to what the real, underlying relationship is between you, as opposed to just something that "just never comes up". YOUR idea of what constitutes a real friendship and theirs may be a very different thing.

And then again, who knows? These are people you are acquainted with in real life. Why not ask THEM how close your friendship is, and if it IS as close as you seem to feel it is, why they aren't talking to you about issues that affect their lives.

If they are anything like gay friends from back in the rural, very fundamentalist Christian area of PA where my sweetie came from and where we lived for many years, they are, even if "out of the closet", probably VERY interested in not "making waves" in a community where they cannot feel complete acceptance, since a large proportion of the population would see them as sinners, immoral, unnatural and perhaps even a threat to their children (as propagandized by the American Family Association). In a world where hellfire and brimstone is preached from the pulpit against homosexuality, I suspect that the heterosexual people they REALLY feel comfortable with are few and far between. JMHO

[Catwoman]

Actually LC, they are highly educated professionals - I want to say - Episcopalians - in a moderately sized coastal city, not your rural backwater, no banjos playing in the background.

[loosechickens]

hmmmm....just so YOU understand that a moderately sized coastal city in Texas is still not a really gay friendly place.... ;-)

So......even in a moderately sized, coastal city that has Episcopalians, there are still folks who think that gay rights or gay equality is just something "dreamed up as an issue by the left"? Just askin'...........however cosmopolitan it might be by Texas standards...........

Our rural area of PA hard along the NY border was close enough to places like Ithaca NY and Cornell University to go up there for lunch (when you began to think that the whole world must eat Wonder Bread and only iceberg lettuce), but there were plenty of figurative banjos there.......

[Catwoman]

right.... please tell me all about MY life...

and Yep, there are people who feel like I do in all parts of the nation and world, its not really a good idea to paint everyone with the same brush now, is it?

[Zigzagman]

I know several gay couples and have known many through the years. My DW owned a beauty shop in Houston Galleria area for many years and she actually recruited gay hairdressers because they and their flamboyant attitudes were desirable.

Living in rural Central Texas I am now seldom exposed to the gay community (although everyone used to say that Austin was a mecca for gays in Texas) but a similar analogy for me is the religious community. I am a flaming liberal, always have been. I am constantly in conversations about conservative issues with my neighbors. Their reaction to me and my DW range from never speaking to us again after finding out we are heretics to others being totally non-judgmental with regard to religion (or at least to my face).

I don't think you can have much of any kind of relationship with people without some issues becoming a topic of conversation. Sex, religion, and work are common topics where I live. In the case of religon it is really the center of most people's live especially in a rural community - it is their way to connect with each other and believe me their opinions are strong publicly and privately.

I guarantee you that is the reason for Gov. Perry hosting this prayer festival. In Texas like most of the bible belt there is no better way to attract conservative voters than religion - it seems to be almost their purpose in life. So in that regard this is a clear message to the religious community and the more outrageous it is the better the right likes it. They have a cheerleader in Perry (formally a cheerleader at Texas A&M) for their agenda and there are not lines of separation between church and state for people like that.

For him to deny it is just not being truthful.

Peace

[loosechickens]

Catwoman.....you are perfectly entitled to your opinion. About anything. But if your viewpoint is to see gay rights and equality for gays, including the very basic right to enjoy the benefits of marriage the same as any other citizen, as something that gays are being manipulated into by "the left" for their own political reasons, you are going to find yourself in an ever decreasing minority. The country has moved on, just as it moved on in the question of civil rights for African-Americans.

I am old enough to have traveled in the south when there were "colored" bathrooms and water fountains. My own mother thought she was VERY enlightened because when they were home alone, she sat in the kitchen and had lunch with the maid. My grandmother called black people "darkies", and my very religious uncle pitched a fit when a black couple showed up to sit in HIS church.

Those were VERY common attitudes among whites in those days. Honestly, when I was young, I don't even remember QUESTIONING that the black people couldn't use the public swimming pool, and I was in junior high when schools were integrated after Brown vs. the Board of Education, although in the case in our school, it meant only that two very frightened young black girls came to our school, and when I talked to them in the lunchroom, I was ostracized by my other friends.

TIMES CHANGE......and they don't change evenly, or at a pace where the people who ARE in the privileged group think is appropriate or in line with their beliefs and views. And sometimes those people would like to pretend that the desire for change, and the push toward politicizing that change, which is necessary for it to happen, is something that some group (on the opposite political side of the abyss) is manipulating people who would otherwise be satisfied with the status quo, for their own reasons.

As Kib says.......this is fast becoming a moot point, especially with young people. Attitudes about gays and lesbians are almost polar opposites in the under 35 as opposed to the over 50 demographics. Demographics, if nothing else, will turn the old ideas of how gays should live, and what they should be "satisfied" to have on its head.

The attitudes displayed by the Christian fundamentalist right about gays are fast becoming obsolete. As is the long used refrain "but the Bible agrees with ME", when used to discriminate, just as it was used to support slavery, Jim Crow laws and all the other ways that a dominant group found to discriminate against others. Sorry.....that's just how it is.

edited to add: Gregg is correct.....you are to be commended for hanging in there on this discussion when you find yourself in such a minority. It's hard to be the person that many other are disagreeing with......I've found myself in that situation more than once, and it's not fun.

[Catwoman]

Well, even if my viewpoint is becoming obsolete...there are still a few Jews who keep kosher...I'm good with being a minority

[Gregg]

As Kib says.......this is fast becoming a moot point, especially with young people. Attitudes about gays and lesbians are almost polar opposites in the under 35 as opposed to the over 50 demographics.

My own kids grew up with a gay uncle so its a no brainer for them. Several of their friends did not have anyone so close who was gay. Even so, I have yet to hear any person from that group (now up to age 27 or so) ever question that gays should have all the IDENTICAL rights and privileges that any of the rest of us do. Note: IDENTICAL, not special. Those friends are from a very wide demographic. The primary thread they all share as a link is education. Most of them met in school and most continued through college and beyond or are still there. Since it usually stands that our leaders are well educated I am quite hopeful that discrimination for something over which the individual has no control is quickly dying on the vine. The new up-and-coming leaders of this country will have other issues that need their undivided attention.